Review: All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven
The writing and characters are wonderful, but if you’re looking for a book about depression, I’d pass on this one.
The writing and characters are wonderful, but if you’re looking for a book about depression, I’d pass on this one.
For disabled characters, being cured is a common trope. What’s more, in most of these narratives, the characters are cured because they’re better than they were at the start of the book: kinder, gentler, braver. And finally, finally, they’re normal and whole.
Skim does a good job of showing misguided attempts to help those with depression, and lets the reader see the absurdity for themselves.
Everything, Everything starts out as a respectful, sensitive narrative with incredibly likable characters, but ends on a shockingly disappointing note in terms of disability representation.
Julian Birch has a “withered” leg from a childhood bout of polio, and Mitchell’s depiction of him is one of the most believable, relatable portrayals of disability I’ve come across.
This book portrays its autistic protagonist in ways that will give readers negative, incorrect, and in some cases abusive ideas about autistic people.
When I received my diagnosis of Asperger’s syndrome seven years ago, I thought of all the young people today who face the social challenges and bullying that I faced decades earlier. I wanted to create a character like me, but one who fights back against the way others treat her in a way that I never did.
The most common wheelchair-using character has acquired paraplegia, but why is this particular narrative so prevalent, and at the expense of all others?
I can’t tell you how many times people have been dismissive or incredulous about my mental illness, simply because I don’t fulfill their preconceived notions about bipolar individuals.
To help authors make informed decisions about what language to use, we talk about disability terminology–from outdated words and cringe-worthy phrases to straight-up ableist slurs, and everything in between.